Today, Explained - How UFC explains USA

Episode Date: June 21, 2024

The Ultimate Fighting Championship went from niche bloodsport to multibillion-dollar league. Donald Trump might be its biggest fan. Journalists Luke Thomas and Sam Eagan explain the culture and politics of the UFC. This episode was produced by Hady Mawajdeh, edited by Lissa Soep, fact-checked by Laura Bullard, engineered by Andrea Kristinsdottir and Patrick Boyd, and hosted by Noel King. Transcript at vox.com/today-explained-podcast Support Today, Explained by becoming a Vox Member today: http://www.vox.com/members Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Donald Trump's first public appearance after his conviction on 34 felony counts in New York last month. Also with us tonight, 45, Donald Trump is in the building in the form of president. He went to a UFC fight. He used that night to launch at real Donald Trump. The president is now on TikTok. It's my honor. Take photos with fighter and men's rights weasel Sean Strickland and revel in cheers

of We Want Trump. If you're not an ultimate fighting championship fan, you may be unaware of this long-running relationship between candidate Trump and the league. But it's real.

And in 2024, it's meaningful if you want to understand Trump and his base. And also John Wick and football. Coming up on Today Explained, Hadi Mouagdi presents How UFC Explains USA.

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Up next today, X-Plane! Luke, go ahead, give me your full name and tell me what you do. My name is Luke Thomas. I'm a combat sports analyst, currently for CBS Sports, but I have my own YouTube channel. I have a podcast as well, where I cover both mixed martial arts and boxing in terms of the big events, the day-to-day news, and everything in between. All right, so I've never been to a UFC fight. So tell me how this goes. I step into the stadium, and tell me everything that I will see and hear and feel.

It's going to be loud. It's going to be dark. And it's going to be bright and shiny at the same time. It's going to have, you know, like a strobe light kind of effect at times. But here's what I would say. You're walking into a place with predominantly young males, although certainly not exclusively, somewhere between the 18 years old to, let's say, 49-year-old range. And you're going to see a series of combatants both take turns walking out to the octagon, and they're going to compete in this bout. Now, these bouts are happening in different ways for different reasons. Some guys are at the beginning of their career. The main event will obviously feature much more established talent. There is a new showman in the UFC. Enter the credentialed Michael Venom Cage.

But there is going to be a broader show. The way I would explain it is to maybe a softer version of the Mos Eisley Cantina, where Han Solo and Obi-Wan Kenobi walk into this bar, and it's all of these sort of strange different kinds of creatures from around the universe. That's an exaggerated example, but you're definitely going to see extremely loud, extremely in-your-face kind of production and sound design, but the UFC fans absolutely love it, and obviously the product is doing quite well. Yeah, how well is it doing? I mean, it depends on how you want to evaluate it. The UFC was sold in 2016 to basically Endeavor.

Is this the happiest birthday yet after making $4 billion? It doesn't suck. There are current estimates that puts it in the $10 billion range as well. I mean, again, some of this is speculative. So it's not nearly as big as that. It is growing in parts of Southeast Asia. It's already been big to an extent in Japan. It's growing throughout Europe and sort of Middle East, North Africa as well.

Tell me how the UFC has evolved over the years up to the present day. The story basically begins in Denver of 1993. Eight of the deadliest fighters in the world will meet in a no-holds-barred combat to determine who is the ultimate fighting champion. And at this time, you have every different kind of guy you can imagine. This giant sumo guy, this kickboxer guy from various parts of Europe. No one really knew who they were, but it was all designed to be an infomercial for Gracie Jiu-Jitsu. The Gracie family is the most important family in the history of martial arts.

There was a Gracie family that had adapted a style of Judo from, obviously, Japan. Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu is largely a part of this one dynamic, incredible family. And if you look at that family, all the fucking champions, Hoist, Horian, Hickson. And they had kind of adapted it to make it use for anybody of any different kind of size. They had to develop the concept

of cooking your opponent. You know, all that wasn't in Japanese Jiu-Jitsu. It wasn't in Judo. And so they sent out one of their family members, Hoist Gracie, who was not the biggest guy in that family, who was not the best grappler in that family. And what they thought they could do was if we put him in all of these other matches against all these other guys, what people are going to see is that Gracie Jiu-Jitsu is the dominant style of fighting, period. And of course, Hoist Gracie really dominated.

Hoist is the ruler. He is the greatest champion on the planet. Unbelievable. Those blows were devastating. course, Hoyce Gracie really dominated. And that's really the genesis of how it all kind of got started. What it ultimately did is it sent forward, and again, it was in a really rough state with very minimal rules, if at all. For example, today, hair pulling, band,! Band. Eye gouging. Oh, my eyes! Band. Fish hooking. Get your ringers out of my mouth! Obviously. Band. Attacking the clavicle. Band.

You could do basically all of that stuff, or at least a big majority of it, back in 1993. And so over time, this begins to get this really appealing form of combat, where guys who used to be division one or olympic alternate wrestlers they wanted to get on the action and they had some success so you had this sort of really interesting amalgamation of different people wanting to try this and it gained popularity but it also had notoriety as well because it was unsanctioned because the rules really weren't established but you might recall in 1996 this this is when Senator John McCain called it human cock fighting. I mean, I've seen people repeatedly getting smashed in the face with a guy sitting

on top of them. That's not a sport. And that really sent it to a pretty terrible place. It got kicked off of pay-per-view in many cases. Eventually, a lot of states didn't even want anything to do with it. They would shut it down last minute. And in January of 2001, the guys who originally founded the UFC, they threw in the towel. They just couldn't take it anymore. So they sold it for $2 million to Dana White, Lorenzo, and Frank Fertitta. Those were two casino magnates from a pretty important family in Las Vegas. And those guys didn't have success either. They were constantly having problems, constantly having issues with their shows. In

fact, when they first got off the ground, those initial shows were a disaster. But in 2005, The Ultimate Fighter hits. What we knew we had to do was to get on television and reality shows were big. So the thing was, we're going to put fights on TV, but we're going to put it on through reality. The world got to see really unique people doing a really crazy thing at the height of the reality TV show boom. And it worked for the casual audience who had maybe heard of UFC. This put a brand new face on it. This was something that they could see the individual human stories. They got to watch them fight in this house, in this sort of in-house tournament. And it eventually culminated with a live fight on Spike TV. Tonight, it's Steppen Bonner and Morris Griffith for a UFC contract.

It was what we would call now a viral sensation, a slobber knocker, if ever there was one. What is keeping these guys going? Flooded, battered, but neither can be beaten. slobber knocker if ever there was one. That led to a second season on Spike TV. In came more money, which came more shows, which came more notoriety. They signed deals with ESPN. They get billion dollar valuation. It really was a seminal moment in the history of that organization. And it sounds like Dana White is the guy who ushered it into the modern age. Who is this man? Tell us about him. Yeah, Dana White is a guy who grew up in the Boston, Massachusetts area. He, I think, initially wanted to try his hand at boxing, I think, found that it wasn't necessarily going to be something he could do professionally,

but I think wanted to be involved in the sport, had done some managing. He was managing UFC fighters, by the way, at the time of the acquisition. He was a ferocious competitor with other MMA organizations. He was a dyed-in-the-wool fight fan and always has been. You can make any number of different praises or criticisms of Dana White, but the one thing you must always get right is he is very, very much a real fight fan. And he had this moment in time where he knew MMA could be popular. It could be interesting. And he would go state by state, editorial board by editorial board, TV station by TV

station, proselytizing about the UFC product as best they could. And again, amid these rising fortunes would make these claims about what it could be. Some of which were a little bit silly, but a lot of them proved quite correct. And they convinced a new generation of people basically to be fight fans again. It's his controversial stances on things or the way in which he presents himself that was seen as in a world where Roger Goodell is very buttoned up and doesn't tell you anything Dana White will give you the finger and tell you exactly what he's thinking at that time that was a huge differentiator for him amid a surging

different kind of brash brand he was at that time a sort of perfect avatar for what they were doing some people can't deal with chaos. Some people can't handle the pressure. I love that. I would describe him as extremely hardworking, extremely driven. At the same time, I think somebody who is that driven and that successful and that determined

to see a product or a vision brought to life, they can also be mean, they can also be mean they can be cruel they can be vindictive at the turn of the previous year he got into trouble because he was seen exchanging blows with his wife for a new year's eve party slaps but blows just the same and had had previous issues with the that same brash attitude that endeared him to so many would sometimes cross the line into some other less savory forms of expression. And that has made him polarizing and controversial, but certainly popular and important. Popular and important. And here's why I want to try to put our finger on important in what way. In what way is the UFC culturally

significant in America? This has changed over time, but I would say you can just see the success of MMA and UFC everywhere. So there have been UFC superstars, for example, like Conor McGregor. He's in the recent Roadhouse movie with Jake Gyllenhaal. I told you my business happened in the audience. I was trying to be thoughtful. Not a very good movie, but that's not a nobody in Hollywood. Amazon is not a nothing studio. These are well-capitalized sort of A-list celebrities that now one of the major fighters is involved with.

I would also argue, for example, if you watch movies like John Wick, the quality of the fight scenes themselves have dramatically improved in part because people really didn't know what fighting looked like in 1993. You knew what boxing looked like. You knew what kickboxing looked like. You didn't know what was going to happen when the rules were just basically widened to allow for a broad base of them. And now you do. I would also argue the audience skews in a way that it did not necessarily used to much more towards the male high school age. And so you just see big influence among what athletes they cite and who is attending these

shows. I mean, here's a perfect example. Who is the coach for the Boston Celtics? I think it's Joe Mazzulla. He's only 35 years of age. To get his players hyped for games in the finals, he was showing them footage of UFC fighters escaping chokes. This is the kind of thing that it has. It represents what apex human battle is supposed to be. It has created larger-than-life figures, and it's created a certain base understanding of what these struggles look like, and it has been majorly influential. Luke Thomas, sports analyst, CBS.

Coming up, how Dana fell for Donald. and spend management software designed to help you save time and put money back in your pocket. Ramp says they give finance teams unprecedented control and insight into company spend. With Ramp, you're able to issue cards to every employee with limits and restrictions and automate expense reporting so you can stop wasting time at the end of every month. And now you can get $250 when you join Ramp. You can go to ramp.com slash explained, ramp.com slash explained, R-A-M-P dot com slash explained. Cards issued by Sutton Bank. Member FDIC. Terms and conditions apply. The ACLU knows exactly what threats a second Donald Trump term presents. And they are ready with a battle-tested playbook.

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I'm Noelle King. Sam Egan is a reporter and documentary producer who's written about Donald Trump's relationship with the UFC. Yeah, so their relationship starts in 2001. UFC had just been acquired by Dana White and the Fertitta Brothers, and the UFC was in sort of a pretty sad state. It was being sort of like regulated out of existence. So we had a hard time finding venues, and Trump literally called us. Trump stepped up and offered to host two events, UFC 30 and 31, at Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City in 2001. We get there, greatest setup for us, he did this whole thing for us,

showed up to the first fight, and was there till the last fight. And then Trump actually steps away and starts his own MMA promotion in 2008 called Affliction MMA. It only lasts for a few events, but he kind of tries to step into the MMA game himself, which I think speaks to the fact that he is earnestly a combat sports fan. And then it kind of falls under the radar, I think, really until 2016, when Dana White is one of the first people to publicly endorse Trump. Donald has great business instincts. And he even gives a speech at the Republican National Convention that year.

He supports businesses of all sizes. He'll make it possible for them to grow and succeed, which is the backbone of a strong economy. And in that speech, he's very careful, as he still is largely, you know, sort of very delicately tiptoe around the nuts and bolts of the politics stuff and to speak to Trump the person. For over 15 years, Donald Trump has been a loyal and supportive friend. And I know that if I needed Donald, he would be there for me,

just like he was when I first met him. And talks about Trump bringing the UFC out of, sort of out of the ashes and helping it rise to be like this massive sports business. That's incredible. So really early on in 2016, when there is a lot of skepticism about Donald Trump, the candidate, Dana White is fully behind him as a friend. And talking about him in the way that Trump does love to be talked about, which is he's a businessman. He did the business thing. Exactly. Yeah. So Donald Trump, close listeners of the show may recall, was in fact elected president. And then what happens with the relationship? There's a few appearances here and there, but I think it really, really picks up in 2019. The event that sticks out in my mind was UFC 244.

That was in November of 2019. And just a few weeks before that, Trump had been booed at the World Series. I don't know if you remember that. He was sort of famously booed at the World Series. Booed in his own backyard. That was the reception at Nats Park when President Trump showed up on the Jumbotron at game five of the World Series. And he makes an appearance at a UFC event shortly after. And, you know, it gets the whole, the full treatment.

The cameras pan to him and fighters are cheering his name and talking about him in their post-fight interviews. I think we recognize, no matter what your views are on Trump as a president, the guy's a bad motherfucker, man. And that starts a bit of a trend, and he continues to appear at events periodically for the next few years. But then in 2023, it really takes off. And by my count, he appeared at three separate events in that year alone.

As I was watching these events, I would notice, like, this feels like a captive campaign stop for Trump. Making his way into the building, one of the bigger Mixed Martial Arts fans I know, President Donald Trump. And that sort of pace and that relationship has continued into this year. He's already appeared at at least one event. And I'm sure there'll be many more in the lead up to the election. I understand why the UFC appeals to Donald Trump. And I understand why Trump appeals to Dana White.

But the UFC is more than Dana White. It is an entire mainstream sports league. What is it about Donald Trump that appeals to the UFC beyond Dana White as a sports league? I think that the UFC has like largely achieved regulatory capture around the sport of MMA. At least 90 cents of every dollar spent on the sport of mixed martial arts globally is spent with the UFC has like largely achieved regulatory capture around the sport of MMA. At least 90 cents of every dollar spent on the sport of mixed martial arts globally is spent with the UFC. And the relationship with Donald Trump helps them to preserve that vice grip that they have on the

sport. To have a president who is deeply pro-business and in no way antitrust, it would be deeply beneficial to the interests of the UFC. I wonder also about the UFC's politics. Like the NBA, the NFL, they have been initially divided by these incidents like Colin Kaepernick taking a knee or players after George Floyd was murdered going on Instagram and making statements. Has the UFC ever,

like, has it ever kind of done that thing where it sort of seems like it's moving left or is it unabashedly right wing? I think that in general, it sort of steers right. I mean, I would say fighting is in no way inherently a conservative sport, but it presents as being about the individual. It's one person competing against one person in a very violent, dominant fashion. I don't know if you're familiar with active clubs, but there's a growing neo-Nazi movement that uses MMA to recruit young people sort of into their ranks,

using MMA as a sort of backdoor into that. So there's these themes of, in the case of the really, really far right, there's these themes of domination and violence that are really, really important to those political agendas that are very easily parallel to MMA, right? In terms of a more sort of mainstream Reaganomics conservatism,

I think that the individual nature of combat sports, I think that this idea of it being sort of sexy and countercultural, right? Like it's not the normal thing to be into. And I think that conservatives really want to appeal to the counterculture, especially at this. Like, you think about, like, people like Gavin McInnes, right, who I wouldn't call a traditional conservative, of course. But there's this deep desire. Like, he likes to say that, like, conservatism is like the new punk, right? There's this deep desire to appeal to the counterculture.

I think MMA is a really, really easy backdoor for that. Tell me about the fighters. What is it about the fighters in MMA, in UFC, that appeals to conservatives, do you think? They almost take the professional wrestling approach. And some fighters sort of end up having like a personas, if you will. One of the people that comes to mind when you ask this is a guy like Colby Covington, who is a former title contender in the UFC, fought for the title multiple times. I want to shout out all our first responders, our military. Those are the real heroes, the celebrities of our country. I also want to shout

out Donald Trump. You can delay us, but you can't deny us. He's going to make America great again. We need these boys. And has sort of made his career by presenting as this super hyper MAGA dude in all of his fight promotions. Whenever he's on mic, he's wearing a red MAGA hat. You are a great fighter, man. I'll tell you, you make it so easy. I don't know how to... Congratulations.

I wanted to watch that fight tonight. Thank you so much, Mr. President. You gave me the dragon energy when you shook my hand on Sunday at your rally. He had a title fight against Kamaru Usman and kept referring to him over and over again as Fake Newsman. Like just doing things sort of like this. Being very open about his politics in a way like I don't even think you see people doing

in the NFL or the NBA. There's fighters like Jorge Masvidal who is a Cuban-American fighter from Florida and in 2020 led this bus campaign around Florida called Fighters Against Socialism, which was just a series of pro-Trump rallies. We either re-elect President Trump and keep America great. Amen. Or we let Joe Biden destroy the greatest country the world has ever seen.

There was also Sean Strickland, who famously, a few months ago, got on mic and went on this really, really intense anti-LGBT tirade. You are the definition of weakness. Everything that is wrong with the world is because of fucking you. You're getting these fighters who are saying these really openly conservative, sometimes downright bigoted things. And Dana White, who likes to sort of fashion himself as like a free speech absolutist, tolerates it and then intolerating it is ending up sort of endorsing it. Are we going to see headlines after the election that the UFC and UFC fans got Donald Trump elected? I mean, how useful to Trump the

candidate is this voting bloc? I do not think that the UFC will sway the election. It's still significant. He's shown sort of a roadmap for how to appeal to young men that are typically maybe vaguely conservative, but generally sort of apolitical, and particularly young Latino and Black men. So I think that this is more of a roadmap for how conservatives can continue to make gains and continue to galvanize young male voters in a way that previous Republican candidates have not. And I do think that the UFC is playing a big role in that activation. Reporter-producer Sam Egan. Today's episode was produced by Hadi Mouagdi, a maximalist.

It was edited by Lissa Soep. It was engineered by Andrea Christen's daughter and Patrick Boyd. And it was fact-checked by Laura Bullard. I'm Noelle King. It's Today Explained. you